Rajitha M Prabhakaran
Group Financial Crime Officer at Domestic & General Insurance PLC
A professional with 18 years of experience in Risk, Compliance, Internal Audit & Financial Crime within general insurance sector including 12 years specialising specifically in Financial Crime. As Group Financial Crime Officer at Domestic and General, I currently oversee end to end financial crime operations, embedding resilience across fraud, AML, ABC and sanctions frameworks.
Formerly worked with Aviva insurance for eight years in various disciplines within GRC. I spent two years at WNS Global Services a leading global business process management company, as an internal auditor specialising risk management and finance.
I hold a Master’s in Terrorism, International Crime and Global Security, awarded with Distinction, which grounds my work in a deep understanding of the geopolitical and criminal dynamics driving today’s threats.
Allan Clare FICA, FCII, FCILA, CAMS, CFE, Dip.
Mentor & Advisor at Obsequella Ltd
Allan is an accomplished leader specialising infinancial crime risk and compliance within the financial services sector, particularly banking and insurance. He has held senior executive leadership roles in a range of systemically important institutions spanning a career of over 25 years.
Allan is now an independentmentor working with financial crime (SMF17s & MLROs) leaders in the financial services sector. He also advises regulated firms on financial crime risk and compliance relatedmatters. In addition to his mentoringand advisory activities, Allan is anexpert-witness in the area of financial crime risk and compliance, a member of the International Compliance Association Experts Panel and a Board Director, Trustee and Chair of the Audit & Risk Committee at The Insurance Charity.
In his last corporate role, Allan was a member of theExecutive Committee at HSBC UK Bank Plc, HSBC’s ‘ring fenced bank’, where he was the Head of FinancialCrime Compliance & MLRO with Senior Manager & Certification Regime (SMF17) responsibility. During his tenure, Allan led the UK response to, and successfulconclusion of, its US Deferred Prosecution Agreement, FCA Skilled Person S.166 review and other regulatory matters.
Carmel King
Partner at Grant Thornton UK
Carmel King is a Partner at Grant Thornton UK, leading the Digital Asset Recovery practice within the Insolvency and Asset Recovery team. With 20 years of experience, she specialises in asset tracing, fraud-related fund recovery, and the wind-down of companies, particularly in the digital asset space. Carmel combines blockchain analytics, corporate intelligence, and forensic techniques to support civil litigation and enforce judgments involving cryptoassets. She regularly consults with regulators, provides expert witness testimony, and contributes to policy development in the UK’s crypto regulatory landscape.
Carmel is Vice Chair and a founding member of the CryptoFraud and Asset Recovery network (CFAAR), and serves on the Council of INSOL Europe, co-chairing its Anti-Fraud Forum.
Catherine Wright
Director, Corporate Finance at HSBC Innovation Banking
Catherine Wright is a Director in the Corporate Finance team at HSBC Innovation Banking, where she leads the UK
Corporate Consumer Internet, Deep Tech & Climate Tech sectors. Catherine is responsible for the origination & execution of innovative debt funding for both listed and private mid-market transactions in the Technology ecosystem.
She joined HSBC Innovation Banking in 2021 from Bank of Ireland, Corporate and Markets where she previously managed a portfolio of FTSE 100, FTSE 250 and AIM listed Technology businesses. She is Co-Chair & Founding Member of HSBC Innovation Bank’s EMEA Gender ERG, engaging and leading UK colleagues to advance the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion agenda. Catherine is a Keynote Speaker, Accredited Coach and Founder of the Women in Business Society. She was named #1 Top Future Female Leader in 2024 by Yahoo Finance, Youtube and Involve and named winner of the Great British Businesswoman Awards - Banking & Finance Businesswoman of the Year 2024.
Nicholas Ryder
Professor in Financial CrimeCardiff University
Nic has played advisory roles both nationally (Home Affairs Select Committee, Home Office, National Crime Agency, Law Commission, the Nationwide, Transparency International, Synalogik and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office) and internationally (NATO, United Nations, Cepol, Europol, EUROMED Police, the Dutch Police, the France Telecom Group, the Law Reform Commission of Ireland). Between 2023 and 2024 Nic acted as a ‘Special Advisor’ for the Home Affairs Select Committee for the duration of its investigation into fraud. His research has attracted funding (£2.1m) from the Joffe Trust, StopScams, Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), LexisNexis Risk Solutions, the City of London Police Force, the Royal United Services Limited, The Alan Turing Institute, ICT Wilmington Risk & Compliance, the France Telecom Group and the European Social Fund. Professor Ryder created, and edits Routledge's Law of Financial Crime Series and he is the co-editor in chief of the Journal of Economic Criminology. Collectively, he has published 5 monographs, edited books and over 50 articles in internationally recognised journals including the Criminal Law Review, Legal Studies, the Cambridge Law Journal, the Journal of Business Law, Studies in Conflict and Terrorism and Contemporary Issues in Law. Nic has contributed towards two REF Impact Case Studies in 2014 and 2021. Beyond academia, he has delivered numerous counter-terrorism financing training seminars for multiple financial crime stakeholders including Cepol, Europol, EUROMED Police, NATO and several multinational telecommunication and financial services companies. Nic has submitted written evidence to the House of Commons Treasury Select Committee (2019 and 2021), the House of Lords Select Committee on the Bribery Act 2010 (2019), HM Revenue and Customs (2021), the Law Commission's Review on Corporate Criminal Liability (2021), the Public Bills Committee Report on the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (2022) and the Home Affairs Select Committee (2023). He has been invited to consult by the media including The Guardian, Bloomberg News, the BBC, CNBC, the Sunday Times, the Independent, the Wall Street Journal, the Telegraph, the Financial Times, France24 and the Times Higher.
Nitzan Solomon
SVP of Product at ThetaRay
Nitzan Solomon is SVP of Product at ThetaRay, where she leads product strategy, innovation, and the development of the company’s product portfolio. She brings over a decade of experience building products for financial institutions, from fast-growing fintechs like Revolut to global Tier-1 banks. Nitzan has led the development of advanced platforms in transaction monitoring, customer risk assessment, sanctions screening, and agentic AI systems for investigations. She is passionate about bridging the gap between regulatory requirements, customer needs, and modern technology, enabling financial institutions to reduce risk, increase efficiency, and turn compliance into a strategic advantage.
As a frequent speaker at leading industry conferences and private events, and as an advisory board member and consultant to multiple companies, Nitzan shares insights on AI in compliance, product innovation in financial services, and the future of RegTech. She draws on her experience leading product organizations through hypergrowth and building next-generation AML platforms.
